Best Media Player For Osx 10.4?!!!

[applecharlie25]

Hi, I'm relatively new to macs and computers in general but I've noticed when I go to certain websites to try and watch live webcams or for example previews of certain television progs I get messages saying that I require either windows media player plug in or some other plug in. I recently downloaded WMP and Flip4Mac etc but none of them worked and everytime I tried to use them safari would quit unexpectedly. I'm prob not making much sense am I? Anyway I've managed to uninstall WMP and stuffit expander and flip4mac so I'm back at stage 1. Could you recommend the best overall media player for mac? Thank you. Charlotte

 

[walkerj]

Quicktime is the usual go-to video player for the Mac, but VLC will handle just about every type of media you throw at it. Do a google search for VLC and you'll find where to download it. It is free, and does a lot of other things as well.

Also QTAmateur will play the same video files Quicktime will play, plus it has a full screen mode that you don't need to spend $30 US for. Again with the Google.

Oh, one more thing. Some video you find on the net use what's called the DIVX codec. Google search for DIVX and be sure to grab that. It's a plug-in which will allow Quicktime to play a lot of content that it might not play right out of the box.

You have plenty of choices eh?

 

[iRock]

Hi Charlotte, How are ya? Welcome to Mac-Forums!

As far as Media Players go, well they all play files differently:

I use Quicktime Player for most, with flip4mac for those microsoft formats.

VLC is nice for some...
Democracy for others...
The list is very long!
It really depends on the format of the media.

 

[iRock]

Also QTAmateur will play the same video files Quicktime will play, plus it has a full screen mode that you don't need to spend $30 US for. Again with the Google.

Cough, Cough Bit ......... T... Cough...orrent.

 

[walkerj]

Cough, Cough Bit ......... T... Cough...orrent.

Eh, why bother with that when QTAmateur will do it just fine.

Though, if you're *cough* gonna go there, then the DIVX codec will definitely be needed.

 

[iRock]

lol... cant forget the Codecs.

 

[technologist]

It might help if you posted an example link.

 

[applecharlie25]

I did think about vlc cause my boyfriend has it on his crappy pc I don't really like the idea of torrent does that not mean that others can download off of you or something?

 

[Discerptor]

http://forums.animesuki.com/showpost.php?p=922919&postcount=243

That one player will play absolutely anything and everything, something no other video player on OS X can claim to do, not even VLC (granted VLC DOES do anything and everything except for proper MKVs, which are not popular yet; if you know you won't be running into them, just use VLC: http://www.videolan.org/ ).

Also, forget DivX codec or any of that. If you want to improve Quicktime's functionality in particular, there are only four components you need to make your Quicktime do absolutely everything outside MKVs and subtitle files (which Perian is working on getting to function for their 1.0 release):

http://www.flip4mac.com/wmv_download.htm
Flip4Mac will do all your WMVs. For the love of God, UNINSTALL Windows Media Player when you install this; they can conflict and cause the Internets to explode when you try to view a WMV-based video online.

http://www.perian.org/
Perian will do everything else barring MKV files (including DivX, XviD).

http://trac.cod3r.com/a52codec/
A52 codec will handle audio in those very few files that use A52/AC3-encoded surround sound.

http://www.xiph.org/quicktime/download.html
This will let you play FLAC, ogg, and other rogue formats that small niches of the Internets use. I would install this regardless of how much you use Quicktime or Frontrow simply because it's good to be able to play ogg audio in iTunes (actually I would install all the components so you don't run into trouble with Internet-embedded stuff).

By the way, those components/compilations are all totally free. As for getting Quicktime to do full screen for free (legally):

http://www.mac-forums.com/forums/showthread.php?p=366306

Enjoy.

GRAHHHH what happened to our emoticons?

 

[applecharlie25]

http://forums.animesuki.com/showpost.php?p=922919&postcount=243

That one player will play absolutely anything and everything, something no other video player on OS X can claim to do, not even VLC.

Also, forget DivX codec or any of that. If you want to improve Quicktime's functionality in particular, there are only four components you need to make your Quicktime do absolutely everything outside MKVs and subtitle files (which Perian is working on getting to function for their 1.0 release):

http://www.flip4mac.com/wmv_download.htm
Flip4Mac will do all your WMVs.

http://www.perian.org/
Perian will do everything else barring MKV files (including DivX, XviD).

http://trac.cod3r.com/a52codec/
A52 codec will handle audio in those very few files that use A52/AC3-encoded surround sound.

http://www.xiph.org/quicktime/download.html
This will let you play FLAC, ogg, and other rogue formats that small niches of the Internets use. I would install this regardless of how much you use Quicktime or Frontrow simply because it's good to be able to play ogg audio in iTunes.

By the way, those components/compilations are all totally free. As for getting Quicktime, to do full screen for free (legally):

http://www.mac-forums.com/forums/showthread.php?p=366306

Enjoy.

Thanks so much for all of your suggestions and advice, I did say however that I have very little computer knowledge so I'm soz if I seem a bit dense but I have no idea what WMV's or MKV's are?! lol!

 

[Discerptor]

Thanks so much for all of your suggestions and advice, I did say however that I have very little computer knowledge so I'm soz if I seem a bit dense but I have no idea what WMV's or MKV's are?! lol!

In your case, then, install VLC and the four Quicktime components. That should be good enough. WMV is a file container and a video-encoding/decoding format that Microsoft developed. MKV is a new up-and-coming file container format that's superior to AVI in every way (their file names end in .mkv, is how you would tell which ones they are), but not really popular outside of groups that have to deal with subtitles a lot (anime, foreign films), and even there it's rare.

So for your purposes, I would suggest just installing VLC and the four quicktime components. Also, read my edited post; you need to make sure you don't install Windows Media Player. Having both it and Flip4Mac installed at the same time can be very, very bad. Though, if you're feeling adventurous enough, you can try the step-by-step guide to free full screen Quicktime.

Also, I'm pretty sure the components I linked you to all either use installer packages (icon will look like a cardboard box being unpacked) or are pretty self-explanatory, but you install a component (if any of them just supplies the raw .component file, looks like a white lego piece) by dragging it to the folder /Library/Quicktime/ (A52 is kind of an exception to this since there are multiple parts, but the page explains it)

Also, I'm not sure just how new you are to the Mac thing, but just to be sure, remember that you install Applications (like VLC) by dragging them to the Applications folder. Also, I would install The Unarchiver instead of Stuffit:
http://wakaba.c3.cx/s/apps/unarchiver.html
It can do a lot more formats and just seems to fit better.

 

[qwinkan]

hello, hi-jacking this thread =P

i want to start over with my quicktime plug-ins. how do I remove previously placed components? do i just delete them or do I need to uninstall in some way?

thanks =P

 

[iRock]

qwinkan , are you refering to plugins that you have added to Quicktime?

 

[qwinkan]

yes i am, stuff like these...

AC3MovieImport.component
AviImporter-r7 (Intel).component
DivX 6 Decoder.component
Divx Decoder.component
Divx Encoder.component
Perian.component
XviD_Codex-t58 (Intel).component

 

[slashjunior]

I use Quicktime with Flip4Mac which play the streaming stuff in Safari in addition to RealPlayer.

For everything else I use VLC Media Player. It will play pretty much anything that you chuck at it.

 

[iRock]

AppleCharlie try this! http://perian.org/

yes i am, stuff like these...

AC3MovieImport.component
AviImporter-r7 (Intel).component
DivX 6 Decoder.component
Divx Decoder.component
Divx Encoder.component
Perian.component
XviD_Codex-t58 (Intel).component

qwinkan, some of the information in this Article may help you. Let me know if it works for you:

http://www.macfixit.com/article.php?story=20070502084625394